It does not so very much matter whether a man eats a grilled tomato
or a plain tomato; it does very much matter whether he eats a plain
tomato with a grilled mind. The only kind of simplicity worth preserving
is the simplicity of the heart, the simplicity which accepts and enjoys.
There may be a reasonable doubt as to what system preserves this;
there can surely be no doubt that a system of simplicity destroys it.
There is more simplicity in the man who eats caviar on
impulse than in the man who eats grape-nuts on principle.
The chief error of these people is to be found in the very phrase
to which they are most attached--"plain living and high thinking."
These people do not stand in need of, will not be improved by,
plain living and high thinking. They stand in need of the contrary.
They would be improved by high living and plain thinking.
A little high living (I say, having a full sense of responsibility,
a little high living) would teach them the force and meaning
of the human festivities, of the banquet that has gone on from
the beginning of the world. It would teach them the historic fact
that the artificial is, if anything, older than the natural.
It would teach them that the loving-cup is as old as any hunger.
It would teach them that ritualism is older than any religion.
And a little plain thinking would teach them how harsh and fanciful
are the mass of their own ethics, how very civilized and very
complicated must be the brain of the Tolstoyan who really believes
it to be evil to love one's country and wicked to strike a blow.

A man approaches, wearing sandals and simple raiment, a raw
tomato held firmly in his right hand, and says, "The affections
of family and country alike are hindrances to the fuller development
of human love;" but the plain thinker will only answer him,
with a wonder not untinged with admiration, "What a great deal